The sooner you can get your mind and body around this approach, the sooner you can step out of strength training and into a greater sense of ease with one of the more challenging aspects of running… hills. So, don’t think of pushing yourself up a hill with your legs. Think instead of pushing your legs down the hill with your hips by engaging your obliques to drive those hips in a rearward swing. This will allow your legs to relax and be more passive.

One of the best ways to get your leg muscles not to work is to imagine an invisible line of energy running from your hip to your heel. As you drive your hip to the rear, think of that connection from your hip to your heel and bypass the engagement of your quads and calves. This is most effective if you can totally relax your lower legs. Be sure to lean into the hill and shorten your stride… cadence always stays the same.

(Note: Pelvic Rotation is explained on pgs. 99-100 in Chi Running and active use of the obliques is explained on pg. 181 in Chi Marathon. For a visual explanation check out the Hills and Trails DVD.)
 

I have a running route in my neighborhood that has short, low rolling hills, the perfect configuration for a practice session I call the Strength and Stretch workout. I gave it this name because I use the uphills to strengthen my obiques, and I use the downhills to work on my lower body range of motion (ROM). Here’s how it goes:

First, I do a 5-10 minute warm-up on level ground to get my legs loose. That’s about how long it takes me to get to the start of the hills. Then, as I start up the first hill, I pull my hands in close to my chest and swing my arms in a forward and upward motion, like I’m a boxer doing an upper cut. As I swing my arms forward I use my obliques to drive my same-side hip rearward. This creates a very nice opposite balance to my forward swinging arms. As my hip is being driven rearward, my leg is relaxed so I’m not using leg strength to push myself up the hill. Instead, by obliques are driving my hips, which in turn drive my legs. The idea, on uphills, is to always use as little leg strength as possible. So if I can give all of that workload to my obliques, I’m happy to. On the next stride the opposite side of my body does the same thing. Needless to say this is a great upper body workout. The crucial thing to remember when attempting this is to NOT USE YOUR LEGS. Keep them relaxed and hills will become much easier.

On the downhill sections I’m doing a number of things. I’m focusing on keeping my shoulders facing straight forward down the hill while allowing my pelvis to rotate to it’s heart’s content so that my legs can truly open up into a nice long stride. A sense that I try to feel in my body is that as my foot touches the ground, it’s already heading rearward at the same speed as the road. As soon as I feel my foot touch down I release my hips and deeply relax everything from T12 on down.

This workout provides great core-strengthening and cardio conditioning on the uphills and ROM on the downhills. Once you get this down you can work at the next level by doing the entire workout with a metronome without missing a beat on the uphills or downhills.

I’ll be doing this workout regularly as I train for the Asheville Half Marathon in September. It’s an extremely hilly course and equally fun.
 

I've been loving Chi Running in my new pair of Saucony Hattori shoes. Let me start by saying they fit like a glove with no weird lumps or pressure points anywhere. The uppers are soft and stretchy, but not sloppy. They allow my foot to move very naturally and I feel almost no restrictions in my movement.

They're zero-drop, and I'm guessing they have about a 6mm sole thickness... just enough to feel the ground without feeling every grain of sand.

The soles have a nice tread pattern that works great for trail running and pressure points under the big toe, the 1st metatarsal head and the heel are covered by a more dense type of rubber that effectively disallows any sharp objects from being felt. Along with this, there's a nice arch support which few minimal shoes seem to have. I like it.

There's a nice, thin Velcro strap across the instep that does a great job of holding my foot in place with no lateral slippage on rough terrain and with no feeling of constriction.

I prefer to run with these shoes on trails because my personal taste shifts toward a bit more sole thickness for road running. I've been using these shoes for t'ai chi as well and they're perfect for that.

These shoes are also a fabulous Chi Walking shoe for any terrain from sidewalks to trails. They'd even make a great water shoe.

All in all a really great, fun shoe. Oh, and did I mention that they're about as heavy as a whisper?

I turned to my running partner and said, “If that girl made one small adjustment to her upper body, I’ll bet she could knock 3 seconds off her 400m interval times and not notice any increase in effort.

I rarely, if ever, walk up to someone and offer running advice. But, since she looked very focused on doing well, I approached her as she finished one of her intervals. When asked, she told me she was indeed on the track team, at which point I asked her if I could offer her a suggestion that would make her run faster yet easier.

She agreed and I told her what I saw in her form and that her upper body just needed to get more with the program. When I asked her if she ever did crunches, she said, “Sure, all the time.” Then, I told her that although she may have a strong set of core muscles, she’s not taking full advantage of them when she arches her lower back and holds her torso vertical. In order to fully engage her core, I told her she needs to hold her upper body in what feels like a crunch while she’s running, so that it brings her shoulders more forward, a little ahead of her hips. This would throw her into a slight lean and allow her to relax her legs. So, the only focus I gave her was to sit up in her “chair” (I demonstrated sitting forward in a chair and holding your shoulders in a forward position) and to simultaneously let go of her legs, completely… and see what happens.

As she started her last interval I could immediately see the difference in her upper body and she looked much more fluid and very relaxed. When she finished her lap I saw her check her split. She looked up at me and gave me a wide grin and two-thumbs-up. As she trotted over to me I asked her how it felt, to which she responded, “It felt really easy and it was my fastest interval of the day!”

I just had to ask her, “How much faster was it?”

“Three seconds!”

If she took three seconds off a 400m interval, imagine how much she could take off a 5k or 10k run. Experiment with this in your own running and see how it feels. The main points to remember are: Keep your chin down (lead with your forehead), sit up in your chair, and LET GO of your legs (allow them to go almost limp) as you fall forward.

While those temperatures were unexpected in Boston this past April, most of the US is currently in the thick of a blazing summer. Running in the heat can cause muscle and mental fatigue, dehydration, and overheating; some days, the risk (and discomfort) are so great that you cancel your run. Whether you're training for a specific race, trying to maintain your aerobic conditioning through the summer, or working on improving your Chi technique, Danny's practical tips are especially helpful in extreme heat. Check out Michelle Helm's blog in Outdoor Athlete to read about Danny's experience at Boston and what he did to keep his cool. 

“I have a question...we live outside of Houston Tx and our evening temperatures, when we run, are around 95º+ with high humidity. We are trying to run within our heart rate zone and find that our heart rate goes up very quickly and we are forced to walk or run very, very slowly. Do we make adjustments for the heat or do we keep to the recommended heart and just walk if our heart rate goes too high? We are 55 and 60 years old, which gives our heart rate zones at 130bpm and 120bpm.”

My response:
I would first suggest, if at all possible, to switch your training time to early mornings, when the temperatures are at their lowest and your body is at its most rested state. Evenings are guaranteed to be hotter than mornings.

Secondly, I suggest Body Sense how you feel when running in normal temperatures in your ideal heart rate zone. What is your perceived rate of exertion (PRE) in more normal temperatures? Build a physical memory of that PRE and, when you’re running in particularly hot weather, match that effort level, but don’t lower your distance. If you’re running intervals, run your normal number of intervals, but run at the same PRE you would feel in cooler weather.

If you run with an HR monitor, ditch the device in hot weather and go by feel and you'll do much better. Running in the heat is hard enough, and worrying about staying within your heart rate zone just adds unnecessary mental work on top of an already uncomfortable situation. Your body always knows what is best. It’s your mind that complicates things.

If you have a smart phone, an iPad or any other current electronic item that runs on apps, you’ll love this one. Apps are specific computer applications designed to accomplish a given mission and are most valuable when applied at the right time, in the right place. In essence, they’re “purpose driven,” and when you no longer need them, you “close the app.”

All of the various Chi Running and Chi Walking focuses work much like the apps on your hand-held device. When applied at the right time, in the right circumstances, they’re like highly effective, purpose driven apps. Here are some examples of possible “apps” for running your body. Don’t forget to have fun…

Imagine you’re going along and come to a hill. What do you do? Well, if you’re well-versed in your chi focuses you simply open up your “uphill app” and let it “run” your body. Think of all the characteristics an uphill app would have: shorten your stride, lean into the hill, swing your arms forward and upward, keep your heels down, use your y’chi focus to pull you up the hill. Then treat all of these focuses as aspects of one app… the uphill app. Then, when you get to the crest of the hill, close that app and open up your “downhill app” (with its own set of unique characteristics) and off you go, easy as pie.

Go back through the Chi Running book (pg. 117-120) and treat each of the bolded subject lines as a separate app. Then, memorize all the qualities of that app before you head out for your run. When you come upon a situation where you feel the need for a given set of focuses, you simply “open the app” and let it do its magic.

If you have the Chi Walking book, your apps are described on pages 103-135. There are twelve different walks described in these pages, so memorize the focuses for each one and treat each walk is a stand-alone app.

Who knows, maybe in your future you’ll have a relationship app, or a courteous driving app, or raising your kid app. The possibilities are indeed endless when you expand beyond the worlds of walking and running.

Here’s one of the best, and easiest, ways I’ve ever found for teaching yourself to have a set of gears. Set your metronome to beep at your normal cadence, which should be between 170-180 strides per minute (spm). If you don’t want to listen to that many beeps every minute, count your stride rate for one minute and divide by 3 to get what I call the “waltz tempo.” For example, if you’re running at a 180spm cadence you’d set your metronome at 60 beats per minute and it would beep on every third step you take…right–two-three…left-two-three…right-two-three…left-two-three, etc.

Then, start your warm-up with your metronome beeping, and match your stride rate to your pre-set cadence. Here’s the challenge. Try to run the beginning of your workout without your stride rate ever going faster or slower than what you’re hearing on your metronome. Once you’re warmed up, increase your speed to your normal, comfortable training pace while still matching your cadence. After 10 minutes begin to vary your speed by leaning more or less. As you lean more, be sure to stay consistent with your cadence and it will force you to relax your pelvis, hips, and legs and open up your stride in order to match your metronome’s beat. This is a great way to train your body to increase its ROM as you lean more and it’s also the best way to gain speed without necessarily increasing your perceived rate of exertion. Just imagine what this means. It means you could learn to run faster without feeling like you’re working any harder. If this isn’t in your list of things to accomplish with your running, you might want to consider adding it.

I do a workout like this at least once a week to keep my muscle memory accurate, my cadence steady and my ROM variable. If you don’t develop your own set of gears it’s like riding a “fixy”, one of those bikes with only one gear. Having a set of gears is easier on your body, more efficient, and helps you maintain a mindful approach to your workouts.

I am still running to heart rate and though my progress has been slow the heart rate numbers are yet again tumbling and the pace is increasing.  I am doing a lot of running.  The long run remains key for me as I build distance and continue to develop my aerobic base.  As I prepare for a marathon next year, I will be running further than I ever have before on a regular basis.  The harder session once a week has changed to shorter, sharper intervals where my focus is on improving my range of motion and stride length.  This will not be run to heart rate but be more specifically form related.

As long as I follow the pyramid of form, distance and speed as prescribed by Chi Running, I won’t go wrong.  When I started heart rate training, I was expecting to see results quicker but this was not the case for me.  No two bodies are the same, each person responds in different ways.  We all have different issues that we have to deal with in life day to day.  The same was true when I started my Chi Running practise.  This was not easy for me, it has taken years of practise to will my body into alignment and it’s paying off.  Running has never felt better.

So don’t give up!  There will be frustrating times along the way either with your Chi Running practise or your training, there will be obstacles that try to take you off course but trust in the process, listen to your body, you will be surprised by what it can do.

On a separate note, Chi Running was featured in the New York Times last week.  Even across the pond, I can appreciate the significance of this and I am delighted to see it.  There is plenty of discussion taking place in the comments section, so if you want to get involved in the conversation, here is the link to the article.

Happy Running.

Michelle